‘Monstrous’ killer who shot lady in head as she shielded 5 week outdated child has been executed

Oklahoma carried out its first execution of 2025 on Thursday, March 20, giving a lethal injection to a confessed killer who had said in his first interview with police that he wanted the death penalty

Wendell Arden Grissom has been executed by lethal injection nearly two decades after brutually killing a woman as she shielded her friends newborn baby.

Grissom, 56, was convicted in 2008 of killing Amber Dawn Matthews, 23, and wounding her friend, Dreu Kopf, during a home invasion in Blaine County.

The former trucker sentenced to death in Oklahoma for fatally shooting a woman as she held a friend’s new-born during a home invasion two decades ago died at 10:13am at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary.

More than two dozen of Amber Matthews’ friends and family witnessed Grissom’s execution and heard his final words: “I apologise to all of you that I’ve hurt,” Grissom said while strapped to the gurney, an IV line affixed to his right arm. He added: “I regret so much that I’ve put that hatred in your heart for me.”

“It took him a total of 13 minutes to die, and it took him a total of two minutes to kill my best friend,” said Dreu Kopf, who was shot multiple times by Grissom but managed to flee the home.

Grissom and a homeless hitchhiker he picked up randomly decided to burgle houses in Oklahoma.

Dreu Kopf and Amber Matthews were at home with Kopf’s two daughters when Grissom came knocking. He laughed as he shot his way into the house, hitting Kopf in the head, wrist and hip. Matthews grabbed Kopf’s five week old daughter and ran into the room where Kopf’s 19 month old daughter was sleeping.

Grissom then went into the room where Matthews was hiding with the two children and shot her in her head as she held one of the girls. Kopf said she heard Matthews scream and say “please don’t shoot me” before the shots were fired. Thankfully, Kopf managed to escape using Grissom’s truck where she flagged down another car for help.

Police at the time said Grissom fled Kopf’s home using her husband’s four-wheeler. Court records say Grissom and Johns were arrested in a nearby café after locals reported seeing them.

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond had previously urged the state’s Pardon and Parole Board to reject clemency for Grissom, characterising him as a “cold-blooded killer” in January.

Drummond said: “Wendell Grissom took the life of a kind, vivacious 23-year-old who went into nursing to help people and died protecting two innocent children. Amber Matthews’ monstrous murder demands that justice be carried out.”

Prior to the execution, Kopf said: “Amber is always going to be 6 feet under and I will always be the girl that got shot. I’m probably going to always be nervous and scared. It’s taken 20 years of my life that I’ve had to deal with him. It’s a rollercoaster.”

She added that she hopes his death will mark the moment she “will never think of him again.”

During Grissom’s trial, Matthew’s family spoke of the trauma of her death. Her father, Garry Matthews, said: “She was not only my daughter, she was my best friend. In and out of marriages, she was always there for me. The last restaurant we ate in, I can’t go back. Everything that reminds me of her brings back the pain.”

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